The Vanishing Glass
Harry Potter did not like his hair.
He didn’t like many things about himself, of course, so that was hardly unnatural for him, but his hair, especially, was a point of contention amongst his family.
For years, Harry’s aunt Petunia had tried furiously to find some kind of miracle dye to make him look less like a strange, feral child, but no dye ever worked. It would spill down into the sink drain and when he would look at himself in the mirror, it would be brown.. and then the next morning, it would be back to bright, fiery red, curling every which way and sticking out like he couldn’t get enough attention.
The same thing happened whenever Aunt Petunia tried to cut it; before he woke up, it would simply grow right back the many, many inches that had been shorn off the evening before, and he would get beat for it as soon as he was let out of his cupboard.
He couldn’t control it, though. It just happened.
Aunt Petunia never cared, and Uncle Vernon always yelled if he ever tried to say it wasn’t his fault, that he didn’t do anything to make his hair go back to how it was before.
Harry thinks getting beat for his hair, of all things, was a bit excessive, but he’s only ten, so who is he to know? Certainly, he’s not smart enough to tell people it’s wrong. Aunt Petunia tells him often enough that he’s stupid.
“I would have you taken out of school if not for those terrible teachers,” she would tell him whenever he brought home any grade below standard. “You don’t deserve to even hear about the things my Dudders learns.”
Harry thinks that’s stupid. Dudley doesn’t learn anything the teachers teach. Dudley couldn’t barely count to fifty, and that was with the numbers in front of him.
But if Harry brought home a good grade, Aunt Petunia would be furious too.
“You cheated!” she would screech, so high-pitched he wonders if the dogs could hear her. “You swapped homework with my baby, didn’t you? Brat, admit it!”
Harry would have gotten a worse grade if he ever did swap papers with Dudley. His cousin is dumber than a bag of rocks.
Not that Harry minds people who don’t understand school things. There are other kids in school who struggle with maths, or with grammar, and they’re all usually nice enough, if they ever talked to Harry. But Dudley was the kind of stupid that got away with it because he was fat and had round cheeks that the old ladies could pinch and coo over, and a gang of bullies that would beat up anyone who tattled on him. Dudley was the kind of stupid that screamed and cried for his mum when someone called him mean, or dumb, or so much as glanced at his dinner. Dudley was the kind of stupid that would make paper airplanes with his homework and then, when he come home with a mission assignment, would say But mum! Harry ate my homework! And it would work, because he was stupid, but knew what would set his mum off on the brat Dudley lived with, if his mum didn’t immediately turn to comforting Dudley that Oh, sweetums, mummy is sure the teachers must have misplaced it, mummy will make it better!
Harry thinks maybe his Aunt Petunia is a little stupid, too. Maybe she got it from Dudley, or maybe Dudley got it from her.
Or perhaps the both of them got it from Uncle Vernon, who somehow had a job at a steel company, who was the size of a whale and whose face would turn vivid shades of other colors whenever he felt so much as a hint of an emotion other than menial, quiet content at his life.
Which meant that any time he so much as thought of Harry, Uncle Vernon would turn redder than any fruit Harry had ever seen, and Aunt Petunia had made him work in the garden enough for him to have seen quite a few fresh fruits.
Harry had seen Uncle Vernon turn pink, red, green, purple, and, a few times, very white as well. Usually, Uncle Vernon’s face was fairly pink anyway, stressed with how hard it was to carry his own weight. Or red and shiny with the sweets and all the food he ate, crumbs in his mustache and caring his shirt, if he didn’t wear a bib.
Bibs were for babies, in Harry’s opinion, but Uncle Vernon was hardly the size of a baby. He acted like one, sometimes, screaming so hard his face turned red without an inch of his real skin color, throwing his giant fists about in his rage. Uncle Vernon threw tantrums almost as much as Dudley did.
But Harry thinks that outside of the abysmal state of his family, he was quite well off.
Sure, he slept in a cupboard instead of the second bedroom, with all the spiders using him for warmth, but at least he didn’t have to deal with all the crazy people who thought Dudley was so amazing. Except when it came to them ganging up on him, they didn’t care about Harry. And so long as Harry kept quiet and did all his chores, Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon didn’t do much more than sneer and bite complaints at him.
Harry knows how to cook, and how to garden, which a lot of kids his age simply don’t. He knows how to wash his clothes, knows how to take care of his wounds, and he knows how to repair his old glasses with just some tape.
Harry is smart. Not very book smart, because his glasses weren’t very good, and it made it hard to read any books at all, but he was smart when it came to other things. He was smart in the ways that kids his age thought was stupid, but he knows they would struggle to handle when they grew up.
Harry has sent just how useful his knowledge is when it comes to survival, and he knows how useful it is when it comes to living in a house basically alone, when nobody else in the house wanted him to be seen or heard.
Harry knows how to walk without making a sound, knows how to mark and remember all the floorboars that creak and how to avoid them, knows how to sneak snacks and water without being caught, or letting anyone get suspicious of him, for when he’s locked in the cupboard over weekends and school breaks with the only time he’s let out to use the bathroom so he doesn’t stink up the house.
Harry is smart, and that means he knows he’s got to be careful.
He’s never really been interested in certain things, before. He’d been a little envious of Dudley, sure, and especially of his birthdays, of presents and celebrations, and how Petunia and Vernon doted on him, but Harry doesn’t want them to do that for him. It would be too weird.
Harry is envious that Dudley has those things without any catch, but Harry doesn’t want them if it means he gets fat and stupid, doesn’t want them if it means he had to look or act like them.
But Harry does want some of it, sometimes.
To be allowed outside like Dudley, all the time, whenever he wants, without restriction.
Harry knows, though, that staying in was sometimes better. Staying in meant not being chased by Dudley’s goons, means not having to sit in the heat ofsummer in the garden for hours, means not having to deal with people giving him those looks that scream to him that they think he is gross and unwanted.
Harry has never wanted to go on a celebration with Dudley, even of that meant going to Mrs. Figg for the day and dealing with dozens of cats and the pervading smell of cabbages, everywhere, until the Dursleys get back and take him.
…not this time.
Mrs. Figg has broken her leg, can’t take him. Marge, Vernon’s sister hates Harry and would never agree to watch him. Yvonne, Petunia’s friend, is off traveling in Majorca… Harry is too feral to leave alone and risk the house getting burned down.
Not even Dudley screaming and crying had stopped the Dursleys from reluctantly admitting they have to take Harry with them to the zoo.
Not that he particularly wants to go with them, but to go to a zoo at all…
Uncle Vernon furiously warns him not to do any funny business before he even gets in the car, between Dudley and Dudley’s friend, one of Harry’s bullies, Piers trapping him in the middle seat.
Harry would sit on top of the car itself if Uncle Vernon wouldn’t hit him for it, just to get away from the insisted and annoying shoving that comes from both sides.
He feels like he’s already in a zoo.
But the car ride is short enough, and Piers and Dudley are quick to run out to get to the zoo as fast as possible. He’s slow to follow, but not too slow as to get scolded, and before long, they’re looking through the exhibits.
There’s an ice cream stand, and when Dudley and Piers get chocolate ice creams, the lady at the stand sees him, chitters about the stray behind the two boys to ask him what he wants, and Uncle Vernon snags a lemon ice pop for him – the cheapest option, but Harry doesn’t mind. He’s never had one before, and it’s rather tasty.
While Harry isn’t one to gawk at things, he enjoys the many exhibits – the gorillas that remind him of Dudley, only smarter, the tiger that stalks on the rocks, the birds that squawk and squeal until Dudley complains and they have to leave for the more crowded areas, filled to the brim with families excited to have fun on a sunny day.
Personally, though Harry like the reptile section the most.
The lizards, the turtles, the chameleons, the snakes, every size and every color, in hides and on rocks, sneaking through grass and branches, swimming in water, exploring in their too-small cages and glass enclosures.
The big snakes, particularly, were cool to look at when they were just sitting there, basking.
Dudley didn’t think so.
“Move! Move! Daddy, make it move! Its boring when it’s sleeping!”
The banging on the glass doesn’t so much as make the large snake twitch. It hardly even looks bothered at all. Dudley, on the other hand, whines and whines and bangs until he’s run out of energy and groans, running off to another tank.
The giant snake is prettier up close, where he can see the shine of its scales, reflecting back all kinds of colors, even with the blurry of bad glasses.
The snake looks like it would rather be sleeping than having to deal with the likes of Dudley, and Harry agrees. He can relate to the poor snake; Dudley waking him up by stomping on the stairs so loud it sounds like the entire house is imploding from an earthquake, shouting and shouting until Harry finally is let out of the cupboard and then smacking the back of his head with the cupboard door or whatever else was on hand.
No, Harry would also much rather sleep than deal with Dudley.
The snake shifts, moving for the first time since they’d walked in, and Harry watches as it turns its head to face him, directly.
It nods at him and then tilts its head, somehow with an expression of plain disbelief and annoyance.
It looked like it was telling him, can you believe this?
Harry isn’t quite sure how he knows the snake is annoyed, or that he’s sure the snake is expressing that, but he nods back anyway.
“Sorry,” Harry tells the snake, “he’s a bit of a prat. Do you deal with that a lot?”
The snake nods again, like it understands him.
“Me too.”
Harry eyes the plaque on the glass – Boa Contrictor, Brazil; bred in captivity.
“You must be pretty lonely in here,” he says. “I don’t get to go out much. I can’t imagine being stuck in a box all the time.”
The boa’s jaw splits open, like a yawn, and Harry gets the distinct impression it’s implying it sleeps away most of the days anyway.
But before Harry can continue the mostly one-sided conversation, there comes a thundering of Dudley, shouting about the snake being awake, and Harry stumbles back to catch himself. Dudley had pushed him out of the way to shove his grubby hands and face against the glass, to gawk at the boa again.
His palms sting from the concrete, and his face burns hot, and Harry wishes nothing more than for Dudley to get what he deserves – to get put in a box like Harry was, like the snake Dudley is tormenting.
Harry watches in fascination, though, when the glass itself simply disappears, and Dudley’s arms fling out to catch himself on – nothing. Dudley falls into the branches and the little pool of running water, several feet down, and the boa above him snakes out of the enclosure before the glass just… appears again.
As Dudley slowly stands himself from the water and begins to cry, the boa slithers up to him.
“Thanksss,” the boa hisses to him, sounding very excited.. “Sssee you!”
And Harry thinks he must be something crazy as the boa slides away, all muscle, and Dudley starts screaming.
By the time Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia are running up, and other people are screaming and running around, Harry is sure he’s imagined it all, but he can’t figure out how to explain it.
“You!” Uncle Vernon snaps to him, once the staff have gotten Dudley out and they’re outside, Dudley in the car with a towel wrapped around him. “I know it was you, don’t you even try to deny it!”
There’s spittle flying out of Vernon’s red, red face.
“I didn’t do it,” Harry says, anyway, futile, because he knows it won’t be believed. But he won’t just say he did it anyway.
“Shut up! Car!”
When Piers mentions, later, that Harry was talking to the snake, Vernon nearly goes purple.
Harry can’t say he doesn’t find a little amusement in thinking about Dudley’s face in the glass, muddied and scared, even when he’s locked in his cupboard late that night without a meal.
He can’t say it wasn’t at least a little viscerally pleasing, considering everything.
His mood only drops a little when he has the same nightmare as always once he manages to fall asleep in the dark and dust of the cupboard.